


Some things just don't go away

by plzimtrying



Category: King Falls AM (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Bad Dreams, Creepy, Drowning, F/M, Friendship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, My First Fanfic, Nightmares, Sammy Whump, Shadows - Freeform, Spoilers from 68 onwards, Supernatural Elements, idk what i'm doing with tags, kingsie is swimming peacefully, lake, ooohh spooky
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-26
Updated: 2019-11-18
Packaged: 2020-10-28 14:28:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20780084
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plzimtrying/pseuds/plzimtrying
Summary: *Spoilers from episode 68 onwards* Sammy cannot forgive himself for what happened with Jack. The nightmares are getting worse, but thankfully he's got his friends to help him up when he falls down- or in this case, when he starts to drown.





	1. Chapter 1

Sammy dreaded sleep.  
Nightmares will do that to you. Were they even nightmares? They felt far too real; Sammy could interact with things in the dreams, feel objects he picked up, hear everything from the whispers of the woods, to the crunch of his footsteps on the overgrown path. The only reason he knew that he couldn’t be awake was because of Jack.  
Jack was always there when he closed his eyes, in some ways that was a comfort- at least he got to see him again, remind himself of what Jack was- is- like. In some dreams he even got to talk to Jack, hold him, before things deteriorated.  
The nightmares were different, yet the theme stayed the same. Jack would be hurt, taken, leave, even die. And it was always Sammy’s fault- that was always a constant… because it was true. If Sammy had just listened to Jack, been there for him when he needed him, then Jack wouldn’t have gone, or at least he wouldn’t have been alone when the shadows came to take him. If he had just done something, anything, then Jack would still be here, and Sammy? He’d be able to sleep without fear, without jerking awake, heart pounding, arms reaching out to grab someone who wasn’t there.  
Once he tried to just not sleep. Can’t be plagued with nightmares if you don’t close your eyes, right?  
Wrong. Ben found him collapsed in the corner of the kitchen, pressed tightly to the wall shaking with fear and panting hard. Turns out nightmare creatures will start to plague you in the day if you get delirious enough.  
Ben, being the overly empathetic man that he is had helped Sammy to his feet and half carried him to his room without asking questions, only gently reassuring him that they were only visions and that he was here for Sammy. He even stayed in Sammy’s room when Sammy chocked out for him to not leave, he just laid down next to Sammy and talked until Sammy finally passed out. That night he didn’t have any bad dreams.  
He wished he had the courage to ask Ben to stay for other nights; but the embarrassment of having to ask another person to babysit him whilst he slept and the guilt he felt for burdening Ben with his issues always prevented him from reaching out.  
He had brought sleeping pills, and Jack- In- The- Box -Jesus he hoped they worked, he needed them to work.


	2. Chapter 2

Sammy stood by the lake, water gently lapping at the banks. It was calm, there was a slight breeze pushing ripples across the lake and sending leaves spiralling and swirling into the air. He took in a deep breath and exhaled, stretching as he did so.  
In the distance he could see Ben and Emily sunbathing on the boat Ron lent them. Ben swore it was a mission of utmost importance to finally see Kingsie and Emily was 100% needed because her librarian intelligence was key to finding the best spot to stakeout the lake. Sammy had raised his eyebrow and informed Ben that if he wanted to watch the lake, he probably shouldn’t take the girl he couldn’t take his eyes off for more than 10 seconds. Ben had responded in typical Ben fashion by turning several shades of red and garbling out a defensive explanation before realising Sammy was only messing with him and wanted him to have fun. He did offer for Sammy to come but Sammy was aware his position as a third wheel may disrupt Ben’s fully planned out mission to woo the lovely Miss Emily Potter, so he politely decline, opting instead to walk around the lake and take some time for himself. So, he sat by the lake took a deep breath and closed his eyes.  
He let out his breath in a sigh and opened his eyes. The water was clear, light sparkled on the mirror surface. Sammy studied his reflection, bringing up his hands to trace the dark circles under his eyes and the frown lines creased on his brow. Wow he looked old. Something in the water caught his eye drawing his gaze from his tired face to something rippling on the surface. Was that a shape moving under the water? Kingsie? A clawed hand shot out of the water grabbing for him. Sammy fell back with a yell and scrambled from the water’s edge, heart pounding, eyes searching for the creature that was definitely not Kingsie! The thing was gone as soon as it appeared. Sammy gulped then cautiously stood and peered into the lake. It was just gone. It probably wasn’t there in the first place, it was a fish, or something, he told himself, trying to calm his racing heart. He watched the water intently, just in case. Something dark reached for his shoulder and Sammy spun to face the thing.  
“J-Jack?” Sammy froze mid panic to stare. “What, how- how are you here?”  
“Jack? Now that’s a name I haven’t heard in a long time”, the figure looked Sammy up and down the cocked an eyebrow “Surprised to see me?”.  
“I- “  
“Of course you are, after all how long has it been since you let the shadows take me?”  
“Jack wait, that’s not- “Sammy stepped towards the figure.  
“How long Stevens? How long did you let me rot in the void, in the dark?!”  
Sammy reached out a hand to the figure “Jack I didn’t know!”  
“FIVE YEARS SAMMY” the creature swatted Sammy’s hand away “Five fucking years you let me writhe in agony, falling through someone else’s memory in a backwards world of people screaming to be free, to be left in peace, for the pain to stop.”  
“I’m sorry, god Jack, I’m sorry, please, its okay now, you’re here, you’re safe” tears welled up in Sammy’s eyes “come here, it will be okay”, he reached out again. The creature’s eyes met his,  
“Sorry doesn’t cut it” its eyes began to glow, “how long did it even take you to look for me? How long did it take for you to stop being such a coward?” The creature spat that last word but didn’t stop Sammy’s hand from grabbing its shoulder.  
“Too long… I- “Sammy took in a deep breath drawing the creature into his embrace “I know. I should have got you back sooner, should have done something sooner, but you’re right. I am a coward”. Tears fell from Sammy’s eyes as he held the creature close to him, shaking he looked up. “Jack I am so fucking sorry”.  
Tears dripped from the creature’s eyes too, they were wrong, too red, too thick. “I don’t care anymore”. The creature showed Sammy back with a snarl. “You abandoned me, and I learnt to survive, learnt to fight may way out of that hell. ALONE!” Shadows from the trees warped and stretched, reaching for Sammy. “I picked u p a few tricks in there”, the shadows surrounded Sammy.  
“Jack, wait, what are you doing?” Sammy panicked, arms and legs kicking as he was dragged up into the air.  
“The only reason I fought so hard to get out was because of you!” The creature’s eyes narrowed as it lifted its arm.  
“You’re out now, its alright! Please, put me down, we can talk!” Sammy pleaded. The creature closed its fist and the shadows tightened around Sammy’s throat.  
“I don’t want to talk”, the creature snapped, “I’ve been waiting for this, too see you again, to show you how much you hurt me, how much I HATE YOU!” Sammy’s eyes widened and he clawed at the shadows around his throat.  
“Jack, please- “he gasped struggling to break free as the shadows constricted tighter,  
“Does it hurt Sammy? Being betrayed by someone you love?” Its eyes glowed red as the shadows tightened. Sammy tried to speak, his lungs filled with ice, he couldn’t breathe, darkness swam in and out of his vision, it was so cold.  
“Ben!” he gasped out and the creature screeched.  
“You think he can save you, my replacement?” Sammy’s vision reeled everything sounded muffled, his lungs burned. “He won’t save you. Just like you didn’t save me” the creature hissed. The shadows closed over his face plunging his vision into black.


	3. Chapter 3

Sammy jerked into consciousness the ground, gasping and wheezing.  
“Sammy, Sammy, can you hear me?” Hands shook his shoulders and rubbed his back as he coughed up water. “Oh god Sammy please be okay, please be alright. Emily call Troy!”  
“Ben?” He panted.  
“Oh, thank god, you’re okay, you’re okay man”. Ben was kneeling over him holding his shoulders. Sammy tried to sit up.  
“Easy, easy, Sammy.” Emily gently pushed him back down. “Get your strength back.”  
Sammy laid back, letting his breathing return to normal. Ben and Emily shared a worried look and Ben ran his hands through his har.  
“Hey buddy, what happened? Emily and I were just heading back in and we saw you on the shore and…”  
“You just collapsed Sammy, you looked like you were walking away from something then you fell into the lake. We were so scared we wouldn’t get to you in time.”  
“I, I was underwater”? Sammy looked between them confused, “no that can’t be right I was on land…” Sammy trailed off, trying to make sense of what happened.  
“Sammy” Emily placed her hand on his shoulder gently. “You were drowning, if Ben hadn’t pulled you out of the water…Well we were lucky we saw you fall”.  
“I’m just glad we were close enough” Ben wiped his eyes. “You really scared us Sammy” Ben pulled him into a hug and Sammy began to cry.  
“Hey, its okay, its okay buddy” Ben soothed, rubbing Sammy’s back as he shook.  
“No. No it’s not.” Sammy sniffed and pulled away to look at Ben “I saw him Ben. I saw Jack.” Ben and Emily froze.  
“Sammy,” Emily began, turning his face to look at her and wiping a tear from his eye, “what happened?”  
“I’m not sure”, Sammy sighed, “I was watching you guys out on the lake and I sat down and closed my eyes, I guess I must have drifted off and-“  
“I don’t think you were asleep Sammy, at least not fully.” Ben interrupted “We saw you on the shore, you were stumbling around, almost backing away from something. Then you reached the edge of the lake and well…you were under for some time. God I just,” Ben chocked back a sob. “If we hadn’t got to you in time…” Emily put on hand on Ben’s shoulders and the other on Sammy’s.  
“We’re just glad you’re okay Sammy”.  
“Yeah, thanks guys”. Sammy was shaken, likely still trying to wrap his head around what happened. “Do you think it was a hallucination?” Sammy mumbled.  
“I don’t know man, what did you see- “  
“Ben. I think we should let Sammy rest; he’s been through a lot”. Emily gave Ben a pointed look.  
“Right yeah, uh, Sammy lets get back home and you can rest, don’t feel like talking about anything you don’t want to”. Ben stood, brushing some dirt off his legs then reached out his hand to help Sammy up. Sammy took it and tried to pull himself up, but his knees buckled, and he fell into Ben- not quite what he’d planned.  
“Woah buddy careful” Ben grabbed him, and Emily jumped up to steady him.  
“Ben, Emily, Sammy!” Troy called, “I’m sorry I couldn’t get here sooner, I floored it and made my way here as fast I could.” He jogged over the bank to where the others were standing. “You alright there Sammy” Troy asked, face lined with concern.  
“I’m okay now thanks to these guys, a little unsteady as you can probably tell” Sammy cracked a small smile and Troy chuckled.  
“Good to hear bud, now let’s get you home”.


	4. Chapter 4

The drive back home was silent, and Sammy was thankful for that, he didn’t feel like he could talk about what he’d seen right now. They pulled up to their apartment and said goodbye to Emily, she hugged Sammy tightly.  
“Get some rest, Sammy, if you ever need to talk, about the nightmares and well you know… Don’t hesitate to give me a call”. She squeezed his arm then turned to Ben to kiss him goodnight. “Thank you for taking me out today Ben, I’m sorry it didn’t go exactly to plan”. Sammy’s heart dropped; he was fully aware that his ‘incident’ had likely ruined their date, the guilt weighed heavy on his mind. He walked into the apartment to allow Ben and Emily a moment alone and dropped onto the sofa. He wrapped his arms around his chest as he shivered, he wasn’t sure if it was from the cold or fatigue. He broke into a coughing fit, chest aching- I guess nearly drowning will do that to you. He heard the apartment door shut and Ben rush to his side, rubbing his back as he continued to cough.  
“Do you want any water or anything?” Ben asked, concern notable in his voice. Sammy nodded the best he could between coughs. Ben left his side then returned shortly after with a glass of water, he also draped a blanket over Sammy’s shoulders, then plopped down next to him on the sofa. “Do you want to go to the hospital?”  
“I’ll be fine” Sammy rasped between coughs. Ben wasn’t convinced but he didn’t push. Sammy’s coughing subsided after a while and he lent back, exhausted and squeezed his eyes shut.  
After a while, Ben made a small sniffing noise and Sammy turned to look at him surprised to see that Ben’s eyes were shining and he was wiping his nose on the back of his sleeve.  
Ben, realising Sammy was looking at him, hurriedly pressed his hands to his eyes “Sorry, sorry I didn’t mean to wake you, I-“  
“Ben.” Sammy reached over and pulled him into a hug “don’t apologise, I should be the one saying sorry, I didn’t mean to ruin your date.”  
Ben pulled back to look at Sammy in disbelief “Sammy that is NOT why I’m upset, I nearly lost you today and you’ve been having these nightmares, these visions and I never even realised they were affecting you so badly. I should have been there for you”.  
“Ben you’ve done so much for me, I didn’t want to burden you with more of my problems.”  
“Sammy it’s not a burden, it’s clear you need help with-“ Ben made a vague gesture with his hands “whatever this is.” Ben sighed “I’m here for you Sammy, and I get that you might not want to talk about this now, but I want to know what happened. This obviously wasn’t just a dream if you were lucid enough to move.”  
Siting up slightly Sammy sighed as he let his hair down “The dream, visions, nightmare, whatever it was, it was Jack, and he was talking to me.”  
“We, don’t need to talk about this now, not if you don’t want to”.  
“No it's fine, as you said, I need to talk about this. Besides- “Sammy let out a hollow laugh “it’s not like I’m going to sleep anytime soon”. Ben reached out and touched his arm sympathetically.  
“Okay”.  
“I was sitting by the lake, I’m not sure if I fell asleep or if I was just hallucinating but I spoke to Jack, it was like he was really there, I reached out and touched him and he was there, he was real and- and”, Sammy paused choked up. Ben squeezed his arm in encouragement. “He was so angry, so hurt that I left him, that I let him get taken-.”  
“You didn’t let him get taken, Sammy,”  
“But I did Ben, if I had just listened to him, just tried to see where he was coming from he could have stayed, he maybe wouldn’t have gotten so caught up in King Falls.”  
“Sammy there was nothing you could have done, you are one man, you couldn’t have stopped the shadows from taking him, and you couldn’t have stopped him getting into King Falls either, it’s like trying to stop me from getting Emily back”.  
“That would have been impossible” Sammy smiled slightly.  
"Exactly my point!” Ben exclaimed throwing his hands up- narrowly missing hitting Sammy in the face. “Sorry” Ben muttered sheepishly.  
“It's okay” Sammy gently chuckled. “You know I proposed, to try and get him to stay.” Sammy looked away from Ben staring absently out the window.  
“You proposed, to stop Jack from going to King Falls?”  
“I thought that if he had something worth staying for, then he wouldn’t go, he’d stay here, with me, he’d be okay.” Sammy looked at Ben and Ben saw the pain in his eyes “But it didn’t work, I wasn’t enough. He left me to go to King Falls without even saying goodbye, and he didn’t even make it. The fucking shadows got him before he even got out the driveway”.  
“I’m sorry Sammy, god that’s, that’s bad”.  
“It's not your fault Ben, you don’t need to apologise”.  
“No, but I can be here for you” Ben smiled at Sammy. “So, in your vision Jack spoke to you, saying how he was angry at you for not coming to save him sooner? But I don’t get how that ended up with you in the water.”  
Sammy winced, and Ben saw him visibly tense “He wasn’t just angry, he was so full of rage, it was so unlike him. He got madder and madder and started to look less human. He… He is powerful, being in the void so long, he said he learned things, how to use the shadows. He went on about how he fought to get out because of me”. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly “I thought he meant to see me again, to be with me again, but…” Sammy’s voice tightened, and Ben noticed he was trembling slightly.  
“But...” Ben encouraged catching Sammy’s eyes and nodding slowly.  
“He wanted to get out to hurt me, to show me how much I hurt him. He attacked me, used the shadows to grab me” Sammy reached out and touched his throat subconsciously, Ben’s eyes widened with horror.  
“He tried to kill you?!” Ben exclaimed. Sammy choked back a sob and nodded.  
“I guess I must of stepped back or something and fallen into the lake, I felt colder, and I couldn’t breathe, I thought it was cause he was well, strangling me but I suppose drowning has the same symptoms.”  
Ben took in a deep breath and stared at Sammy, his exhaustion was evident, he sounded so defeated and it broke Ben’s heart.  
Ben stood. “come on, you should get some rest”. Sammy nodded wearily and went to stand, he still looked shaky, so Ben put a hand on his shoulder to steady him. As they were walking to Sammy’s room Ben noticed he was limping. He’d bring it up tomorrow, Sammy needed rest right now.  
Sammy all but fell onto his bed and Ben went to fetch some painkillers. When he returned Sammy looked to be asleep, he placed the painkillers on the bedside table and went to leave when he heard Sammy whisper.  
“Please don’t go”. So he didn't. 


End file.
